From 1 January 2019 grocery stores in Turkey are required to charge customers 0.25 Turkish lira (US$0.04) for a single-use plastic bag under new regulations and the Turks have lost their flipping mind over it.
I for one am issuing the seldom given (by me anyway) high five to the Turkish government. It’s the little things that mark the beginning of change unless you are under the gross misunderstanding that climate change is “false news” (insert eye roll here). I personally ditched the single-use plastic bags a long time ago and instead, I seem to have accrued literally hundreds of canvas bags. They’re in the car, in my handbag, under the sink, in the laundry and in Daughter’s school bag. They are in the garden, at my SIL’s and I even have three bags at the local market so they are available for my use (much to the shopkeeper’s mirth but who’s laughing now Mehmet? Huh? Not me, baby!).
Social media has been buzzing (and by social media I mean me because I thought it was hilarious) with photos of genius consumers wheeling wheelbarrows into A101, Teyzeleri washing and reusing their plastic bags, amcaları selling their wife’s mountain-load of bags that she has been saving since 1982 and in an effort to win the Great Plastic Bag War of 2019 one dede even brought his fecking donkey into BIM (which made little sense to me because I usually use the shopping cart when I’m wandering down the aisles). Yes, its all very amusing and even I grasp that we are having a bit of a laugh but the fact is that this regulation is a good thing (despite The Turk having a meltdown when he had to purchase four plastic bags at Migros yesterday – he has never really understood my love of the cloth bag).
Turkey has the abysmal rank of 108 in the 2018 Environmental Performance Index (EPI), produced by the Yale Centre for Environmental Law and Policy, that analyses the environmental performance of 180 nations so every little step forward does make a difference. Istanbul now has vending machines at metro stations where you can recycle plastic bottles for transport credit. I love this! Here in Mersin, you can recycle your old bottles and every bottle that you recycle will drop pet food into a bowl for the stray dogs and cats in the city. Another great example!
I think the Turks just need a little push in the right direction and I can help with that. See exhibit below.
This is Kivanc Tatlitug. He is sizzling hot. If he told me to recycle I would. Plastic bags? Gone. Bottles and cartons? Definitely in the correct bin. Husband? Kicked to the kerb if this is what I could find on my sofa.
So to all the poo-pooing to the single-use plastic bag ban just know that we will adapt. Remember when they banned smoking in restaurants … oh, wait…
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What is worse is that I live quite near a chemical factory. According to their website the factory manufactures “calcium ammonium nitrate and diammonium phosphate as well as fertilizer as nitric acid, sulfuric acid and phosphoric acid production”. What are these things? Who the feck knows as I failed 8th grade science but I am pretty damn sure that the yellow smoke that spews out of the factory at 3 in the morning isn’t good for your health and it is probably spilling its overflow into our waterways causing Blinky to mutate. Perhaps if I serve Blinky up as Marge did then people will start to realise just how dangerous these chemicals are to our environment.
janeyinmersin 